31 Facts About Eduardo Suger

Eduardo Suger Cofino is a Swiss-born Guatemalan physicist, scholar, educator, and politician.

Eduardo Suger is one of the founders of Galileo University in Guatemala City and of the Suger Montano Institute.

Eduardo Suger was born in Zurich, Switzerland on 29 November 1938 to Emilio Eduardo Suger, a Swiss national, and Estela Cofino Valladares of Acatenango, Chimaltenango, Guatemala.

When World War II broke out, Eduardo Suger's father was called up to complete his mandatory military service.

Eduardo Suger's mother spoke no German despite living in Switzerland and traveled to the Guatemalan Consulate in Germany for help returning to Guatemala.

Shortly after she and Eduardo Suger returned, she married Enrique Castaneda Rubio, an engineer and official in the Army, and had four more children.

Eduardo Suger graduated from La Preparatoria and earned extra money tutoring his classmates in math.

Eduardo Suger briefly studied chemistry at Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala before deciding to study at the Zurich's Federal Institute of Technology, the same school his role model Albert Einstein attended.

Eduardo Suger lived with his strict father and stepmother while earning his BS in physics and mathematics and MS in theoretical physics.

Eduardo Suger served in the military before returning to Guatemala in 1964.

Eduardo Suger subsequently earned his PhD in molecular physics the University of Texas at Austin in 1971.

Eduardo Suger has been teaching mathematical physics for more than 50 years in universities in four different countries.

Eduardo Suger taught at the Minerva and Freundenberg Institutes in Zurich; UTA as a PhD candidate in Texas; as a visiting professor in the Informatics and Computer Science departments at Alberto Masferrer Salvadorean University and the Technological University of El Salvador; and USAC, Universidad Francisco Marroquin, Universidad del Valle de Guatemala, Universidad Mariano Galvez, Rafael Landivar University, and his own Galileo University in Guatemala City.

In 1977, Eduardo Suger joined the faculty at UFM and taught technology, accounting, and economic science classes.

In 1978, enrollment for the related Systems Engineering, Informatics, and Computer Sciences department opened; in 1982, this too became an institute and Eduardo Suger was named FISICC's first dean.

Eduardo Suger founded the School of Economics and Business Administration department.

Eduardo Suger founded and directed the Institute of Open Education, which challenges the structure of traditional university learning, in 1994.

Since its foundation, Eduardo Suger has served as Galileo University's rector.

Eduardo Suger has a long history of working with the military as both an educator and an engineer.

Eduardo Suger has been commended for his work in increasing military access to university through his Guatemalan Army Program at Galileo University.

Eduardo Suger was made an honorary colonel for his intelligence work.

Eduardo Suger ran for President of Guatemala in 2003,2007, and 2011.

Eduardo Suger has been criticized for only engaging in politics during campaign season, preferring instead to return to his academic career, and for not aligning himself with a political party unless they approach him to be their presidential candidate.

Eduardo Suger is a critic of the complexity of public higher education and claims it often is what delays institutional changes.

Eduardo Suger encourages strengthening the "academic-productivity" and believes everyone deserves an equal right to education, even guerrilla soldiers.

Eduardo Suger planned to eliminate poverty by expanding the middle class and by heavily investing in and empowering those in the war-torn northwestern part of the country.

Eduardo Suger was interested in turning Guatemala's centralized governmental structure into a federal republic and strengthening the relationship between his home countries of Guatemala and Switzerland.

In 1960, Eduardo Suger met Regina Margarita Castillo Rodriguez during a visit to Guatemala while on holiday from ETH Zurich.

Eduardo Suger's uncle was businessman Jose Cofino Ubico, who cofounded Industrias Licoreras de Guatemala.

Eduardo Suger's wife is descended from the founders of Cerveceria Centro Americana.

Eduardo Suger published four editions of the textbook Introduccion a la matematica moderna, which he wrote with Bernardo Morales Figueroa and Leonel Pinot Leiva.